Heartland Grows School Payments with MCS Buy (April 14, 2014)
Payments processor Heartland Payment Systems has acquired MCS Software, a provider of school foodservice payment solutions at 4,000 K-12 schools across the U.S. The buy is the latest step in Heartland’s strategy of growing its footprint in school-based foodservice payments processing. The Princeton, N.J.-based company now serves more than 34,000 K-12 schools nationwide, representing 35 percent of all public schools in the U.S.
In addition to POS payment processing, Heartland offers an online payment portal that enables parents to pay for students’ school meals, along with other school activity and service fees. The company has been working to grow its mobile offerings as well, launching an app for iOS and Android smartphones last summer that links to Heartland’s MySchoolBucks payment platform. Two months earlier, the company unveiled a similar app for school lunch spending.
Despite the focus on school payments, Heartland hasn’t neglected its extracurricular activities. In July 2013, the company tabbed i2c Inc. to take over processing duties for Heartland’s National Restaurant Association Edge payroll card program. Last September, the company launched its Online Storefront, an e-commerce platform that enables merchants to launch online stores or upgrade their existing e-commerce sites. And in March 2013, promotion-based mobile payment and loyalty network LevelUp announced it would use Heartland’s authorization and settlement network and that both companies would promote white-label mobile payment and loyalty apps to businesses.
